Sketchcrawl #44, UC Berkeley

I had a great time at Sketchcrawl 44 on the University of California, Berkeley campus. I missed the starting meet up at 11:00 because I stopped at the entrance to do the sketch above (and to be honest, because I arrived an hour late due to my seeming inability to get out of the house on time in the morning no matter how hard I try). Most of the students are gone for the summer but there were hundreds of visitors from all over the world and families doing campus tours with their high school students and large groups of teens in summer programs on campus.

UC Berkeley Sather Tower Campanile, ink and watercolor 8×5 in

At lunchtime I met up with Cathy and some other sketchers, and had lunch sitting on white chairs set up for a wedding in front of the Faculty Club. Then I sketched at our meet up spot, Sather Tower, aka “the Campanile,” a tall clock tower in the center of campus. I rode the elevator up to the top and was going to sketch the panoramic view when I noticed someone looking up at the huge bells just over my head. I would have totally missed that sight (until the bells sounded excruciatingly loudly at 2:00 as I was drawing the one bell above). I skipped drawing the panorama since it took so long to understand and draw the bell. Then I took the slow elevator back down and sketched the tower. I only got the top 3/4 in the sketch on the right so added the base with a statue and stairs on the left.

Gary Amaro, Pete Scully and Me

At our 3:00 meet up time I was delighted to spot my friends and fellow Urban Sketchers Pete Scully and Gary Amaro. It was such a treat to see them again and get a chance to look through their amazing sketchbooks. I told Pete I wish I could live in the world he draws. I so love the light and depth and detail in his sketches! Gary’s gouache and ink sketch of a campus building is really gorgeous in person.

I’ve missed going out sketching all the time like I used to. 2014 so far has been the year of the dog. Unfortunately, having been rescued from the streets of Taiwan, Millie is not fond of urban environments, making urban sketching with her rather difficult. She shivers and shakes on busy streets so much that her teeth chatter. Even though she did get into trouble while I was out (see above) in the hour before the dog sitter came to take her to the park, I’ve really enjoyed the time I spend with her and she’s becoming a great studio dog (see below).

Three semi-random thoughts:
1. If the bell rang while I was in the tower, I would have fallen out!
2. Millie is from TAIWAN?? How did you get a dog through all the red tape? That is incomprehensible!
3. The painting on the left in the picture with your sketching buddies is fantastic! Love the cropping, love the tree textures, love the values.

P.S. Too busy with broken email (running on 3 weeks now) to attempt anything with my website and blog. Need to go to the cabin and swing an axe for awhile – that always works!

What a great photo of you in your avatar! So…you can’t fall out — the windows have bars. Millie was rescued by an Asian group that rescued her litter off the streets, got them medically squared away and spayed, and then sent them in a crate with a traveler to the Bay Area as luggage after making prior arrangements with a local rescue group. Her litter was fostered by a young woman who works at a pet store in Sonoma County. Millie was the last of the litter to be adopted, and I found her on Craigslist in the adoptable pets listings. The painting on the left is by Gary Amaro. He is incredible skilled at rendering in all media. His sketchbook is mind-blowing. He’s currently teaching a summer class on sketching and has been taking his students all over the bay area including the zoo for sketch crawls as part of the class.

I’ve been working on my blog/website conversion. It’s about halfway done. The structure is all set up, just need to complete the portfolio sections which are currently about half done, some filled with images I’m going to cull down, and still need to add portfolios for watercolor only and add pricing to works for sale. Once I’ve got it in as good a shape as the original website JanaBouc.com I’m going to transfer the domain over and will have just one site with multiple urls.

Wonderful sketches! Aren’t you glad you went, even though it was so hard to get out of the house. And hard to come back to that mess, I’m sure! But I’m sure Millie more than makes up with it by being such a good studio dog.

Thanks Carol. I am so glad I went. Millie is such a good girl most of the time, but so clumsy. She keeps getting injured. Yesterday I planned to spend the afternoon in the studio but spent it at the vets instead, after she got hurt on the rocks by the bay, running too fast with another dog and got a nasty wound on her leg. She’s a real calamity Jane! $200 later she’s doing ok today. Jana

I know what you mean by year of the dog 😛 Hasn’t she grown. I’ve perservered with taking Degas up the village and yesterday she actually stood fairly happily tied up by the bakers…. she rapidily dragged me home afterwards though, but she is getting more confident. I’m sure Millie will too. Small steps.

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